Welcome

Welcome!

I’m Jason Hodgson (BMus), an Award Winning*, Experimental, and Contemporary Composer with a passion for the Wacky and Weird. Currently I am studying at Canterbury Christchurch University in School of Music at Masters Level, with a focus on Composition.

This website is dedicated to documenting my career and explorations in Experimental Compositions.

Projects and Compositions

My current project for my MMus involves utilising an eclectic array of computers to create an interactive composition as an installation, with aims to help break down the barrier between computer controlled music, quasi-free improvisation, and in general, experimental composition for both the audience and the musicians.

The Website and Blog

Occasionally included throughout this website will be scores and recordings of my compositions. Whilst I do aim to make a paying career as a composer, I am also a great believer of the accessibility of resources. Therefore in a somewhat big-headed/looking-to-the-future kind of way, I will happily disseminate some of my earlier scores to provide those who study and perform music both now and in the future an easier way to analyse, perform, and study my compositions and the person behind them.

This has been directly influenced by my studies. In the past I have found it challenging, and often rather expensive to access the resources I need. Libraries can only hold so much, and the more contemporary composers are, the more unlikely they are to be found in your average university library. To help compensate for this I have created a blog section of the website, where I talk about my composition processes, and how the are developing me as a person and as a composer.

You may also find dotted between all the Composition babble, some reviews of pieces and composers that I have found interesting. These reviews in no way aim to be dry academic style reviews. Instead they the focus is on personal preference and opinion, with some references to other work, and possibly some factoids thrown in for good measure.

Finally, all that is left to do is to welcome you, and to thank you for reading this, and hope that I can keep up-to-date with this website.

I hope you Enjoy!

– Jason Hodgson(21st August 2017)

About Jason Hodgson

Hello! I’m Jason Hodgson (BMus), an Award Winning*, Experimental, and Contemporary Composer with a love for the Wacky and Weird. I am currently studying Music at Masters Level, with a focus on Composition (MMus).

One of the driving forces in my continuing exploration into the realm of sound and music, is my Asperger’s Syndrome. I believe that my unique outlook on the sound world is because of this condition. With it, I feel comfortable to explore the more… unusual ways of creating music.

I’m not all about music: I’m also a massive Geek! More often than nought this crops up into my compositions. For example, A Mummer’s Farceis inspired heavily by a plot from a Dungeon & Dragons® campaign I was lucky enough to watch, and then I turned it into a One-Man Percussion-Opera that was then workshopped by the equally wacky, and extremely talented Chris Brannick.

In addition, I am a huge advocate of using ‘play’ as a creative catalyst. By this I mean taking on the role of a child and seeing everything with fresh eyes. But asking yourself the question “What if I do this?…” you can open up a world of possibilities. If it doesn’t work out, it doesn’t mean you have failed, it simply means it didn’t work. Maybe take an element you enjoyed about you piece of art, and repeating the same process**.